Posts Tagged ‘Humor’

The monthly BFT meeting for the month of May was held at National Gallery of Modern Art on the 31st of May, 2015. Scheduled to start at 11am the meeting officially took off at around 11:30 as members started joining prompting us to join tables. The total headcount was around ten. The topic for discussion was “Insults, their effects on us and how we can respond to them outside safe-spaces and our daily lives.“

This time the meeting was a little different as we had fellow freethinkers who happened to be in town joining our meet. It provided an unusual opportunity to compare the movements in both countries. In the German context, the topics addressed were about resisting Homeopathy and anti-vaccination. We were given button badges and pamphlets carrying messages. Also copies of a magazine. They also introduced us to Dubium C30. It is ordinary sugar branded as a jibe at the sugar pills used in Homeopathy. They also told us about the 1023 campaign. However the materials were in German, if you have understand the German language or you want to read the translation you can visit their web page or their page on facebook.

The discussion moved on to the topic that was picked in advance for the meet. It took a bit of effort to convey what the topic was and why it was important to discuss it. While it is relatively easy to curtail the use of sexist, racist and ableist language in safe spaces like the BFT page, when in other social circles it is hard to sensitize people who are oblivious of such issues and the harm it causes. It is so pervasive and widespread that most of us don’t even realize it most of the time. Often it is cloaked in humor which makes the person questioning it seem like the aggressor. To ask the person to explain the ‘joke’ was a useful tactic that was suggested. Sexism, racism and casteism in the mainstream mass media also came up for their role in promoting stereotypes.